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Making opportunities

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As a speech and language therapist, I am commonly asked the question “Why doesn’t my child talk?” If this is something that you have asked yourself at one stage or another, read on and perhaps all will be revealed?

Many children in today’s society are blissfully having many of their needs met without the need to communicate.

Take the examples;

“Emily it’s time for a drink lets go to the kitchen and get you one” Emily’s mother announced whilst at home together.
“Come on children it’s snack time, lets eat our fruit” announced the nursery support worker to the group of children.

As we know children love routine, they like to know what to expect and when to expect it. As adults we look to create routines to help our children feel safe, secure and confident. When creating these routines, we can often pre-empt our children’s needs and make less opportunities for our children to communicate.

Hence if your child is confident that mummy and daddy recognise when they are thirsty and will provide a drink, there is little need for them to ask for it. Better still, they may even know that you will provide their favourite drink. So the child is secure that their favourite drink will be provided without the need to ask, choose or even complain.

The key to developing good communication skills, is that children need lots of opportunities to practice using these skills. This means they need to use language to make choices, to ask questions, to request, to refuse and so on.

In being aware of the need for your child to make decisions, focus on providing lots of opportunities to make choices each
day. Here are some ideas;
  • Choosing a flavour drink “Orange or blackcurrant Joe?”
  • Choosing in play “Shall we build a big tower or a little tower Sophie?”
  • Choosing during outside activities “What shall we go on the first, the swing or the slide?”
  • Choosing in dressing “blue socks or red socks Charlie?”
  • Choosing between people “Grandma or Grandad to push the buggy?”
It is completely normal that your child might copy the last choice initially. This is fine, the important thing is that you provide them with the choice that they have said. A child must experience that they can impact directly upon their word and that by choosing orange they get orange. Some children will learn quickly to change their choice, others will need a little more support, particularly if your child is generally happy with whatever you provide.

In these cases it is time to become crafty, start to provide last choices that you know your child doesn’t like as much e.g “orange or milk?”. Again make sure you provide them with exactly what they have asked for. A screwed up face and a little distress, will soon create an opportunity for them to communicate, refuse the drink and ask for something different.

If you can focus on creating these opportunities every day for your child, you will soon start to notice your child becoming more proactive, talkative and dare I say opinionated. It is then that the next question arises “Why won’t my child listen to me and not test the boundaries?”.
It is recognised that parents often receive little support in coaching good communication skills, that is until there becomes a recognised problem. Delayed speech, delayed language and delayed attention skills are commonly experienced by a range of children and their families and is often a worrying time.

If you do feel you need support in developing your child’s communication skills, then do contact your local speech and language therapy department, parents are often able to refer themselves now without the need for a G.P referral.

Local sure starts and neighbourhood centres and good places to gain advice and also to talk to other parents about their experiences.

We readily work with parents on developing children’s communication skills and supporting positive behaviour development. If you’d like to discuss your child with a member of our team of Independent Speech and Language Therapists then please do contact us by our client enquiry form. We can also arrange interactive talks for groups of parents.

Sarah Needham – Director of Integrated Treatment Services – March 2008.

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